Because the mask is your face, the face is a mask, so I'm thinking of the face as a mask because of the way I see faces is coming from an African vision of the mask which is the thing that we carry around with us, it is our presentation, it's our front, it's our face.

Ringgold is represented by ACA Gallery. She has influenced numerous modern artists including Linda Freeman and known some of the greatest African American artists personally including Romare Bearden Jacob Lawrence and Betye Saar. Black Entertainment Television (BET) had aired several episodes of the television series Roc in which a Ringgold poster was shown on nine different occasions for a total of 26.

She is professor emeritus in the University of California San Diego visual art department.